BROWN, James Duff (1862-1914) Mitchell Library 1878; 1CL Clerkenwell, later Finsbury 1888; 1CL Islington 1905-1914
Beginning his working life as a bookseller's assistant in Edinburgh and Glasgow, he has many claims to being the outstanding public librarian of his day, his ISLINGTON libraries being regarded as models. He pioneered 'open access' at CLERKENWELL, devised three schemes of shelf classification and was specially interested in music librarianship. He was also a prolific journalist and founder-editor of LW and an author, many of whose books, notably the Manual of library economy (1903, 2nd edition 1907, with later editions by Berwick Sayers and others), were generally regarded as standard works. He was active in LA affairs until his resignation in 1911 and was made an Honorary Fellow in 1913.
W A Munford, James Duff Brown (1968)
b. Edinburgh
Clerkenwell from Oct. 1888
LA Council member
inventor of sheaf or slip cat. method
K. A. Manley, ‘Brown, James Duff (1862–1914)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/59733, accessed 9 Sept 2008]
Mitchell Library 1878; 1CL Clerkenwell, later Finsbury 1888; 1CL Islington 1905-1914
Beginning his working life as a bookseller's assistant in Edinburgh and Glasgow, he has many claims to being the outstanding public librarian of his day, his ISLINGTON libraries being regarded as models. He pioneered 'open access' at CLERKENWELL, devised three schemes of shelf classification and was specially interested in music librarianship. He was also a prolific journalist and founder-editor of LW and an author, many of whose books, notably the Manual of library economy (1903, 2nd edition 1907, with later editions by Berwick Sayers and others), were generally regarded as standard works. He was active in LA affairs until his resignation in 1911 and was made an Honorary Fellow in 1913.
W A Munford, James Duff Brown (1968)
b. Edinburgh
Clerkenwell from Oct. 1888
LA Council member
inventor of sheaf or slip cat. method
(YB 1897, 139-40, with PORTRAIT)
K. A. Manley, ‘Brown, James Duff (1862–1914)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/59733, accessed 9 Sept 2008]